#transitional-justice

#transitional-justice

Atef Najib, the former head of political security in southern Syria's Deraa province, appeared in the Fourth Criminal Court in Damascus on Sunday in a cage and wearing a striped prison uniform. He is accused of overseeing a violent crackdown on antigovernment protesters in Deraa during the 2011 uprising, which sparked Syria's 14-year civil war. The charges include murder, torture and responsibility for massacres, in the second session of a landmark trial.

When the al-Assad regime falls, Ammar, a Syrian lawyer and former Sednaya prison detainee, is determined to uncover the truth about Syria's missing. Haunted by the disappeared and his own imprisonment, he searches for answers in the ruins of Sednaya prison. Among classified documents, he discovers records of enforced disappearances and deaths, exposing the regime's brutality. With each case, Ammar pursues justice and closure, offering families a chance to grieve and heal.

On Tuesday, Tribunal Judge Camilo Suarez ruled against seven former leaders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, a now-defunct guerrilla group known as the FARC. They were found guilty of kidnapping more than 21,000 people. Most were abducted to secure ransom payments that helped fund the FARC's war machine. Hostages were tortured, sexually abused, chained to trees and led on forced marches through the jungle. Some died of tropical diseases.

New measures aimed at healing the wounds on all sides of the Northern Ireland Troubles have been unveiled by the British and Irish governments. They will replace the controversial Legacy Act brought in by the Conservatives that cancelled inquests and prosecutions. Diplomats say it is the result of a year long return to partnership of both governments in conjunction with the Northern Ireland government.

Desperate families flocked to former detention centres, prisons, morgues, and mass grave sites to try to find their missing relatives after al-Assad's removal, and investigators gained unprecedented access to government documents, witness accounts and human remains. A limited number of detainees were released alive, while the fate of tens of thousands remained unknown, rendering them forcibly disappeared. This revealed a major tragedy that affected Syrian society as a whole.

The leaked video showed military personnel, relaxed and showing their faces, before they executed civilian captives in cold blood.